Page 110 of Cursed Shadows 5

I flap my hand in his face. “Pull me!”

His brow knits for a beat, then I swear he shrugs before he’s snatched me by the wrist and yanked me into him.

“Lift me!” My hand is a frantic flurry aimed at the lane, at the direction I need to go. “There, there—ah!”

Hands on my waist, he’s hoisting me overheads.

I lean back.

My weight falls on the rising hands of the fae, grumbling and some pinching at my flesh in annoyance. But they have little choice, since there is sparse room to drop me down, so they must manoeuvre me over them.

It takes just a few heartbeats before I’m thrown, and I flip to land on the cobblestone. My bare feet smack down on the chalky ground, inaudible over the cracks splitting the air.

I swing for the edge of the lane.

Darkness yawns ahead of me.

I squeeze between the damp wall and the table, the blasts of the sparks alighting the skies in flickering moments that illuminate the lane.

Motionless against the wall, I squint at the darkness that flashes bright white, and I can make out the glare in the distance.

Eamon and Daxeel, planted in the middle of the lane, both looking upwards, I assume watching the sparks.

I call out for them, but it’s useless. The thunderous blasts are enough to shudder the buildings of Kithe and silence the songs of the parade.

My voice isn’t getting through that.

I push into step.

The soles of my feet are padding on the stone floor, quickening as my pace does—

Then the blast of bright blue sparks erupts above. The light washes over the lane… but just for the quickest of moments, then it’s gone, then returns, a flash, a blink, then gone…

It goes like that, a constant assault to my gaze.

But in those fleeting, fractured moments, I see them.

I see the litalves.

They keep to the shadows, shoulders pressed to the wall as they prowl up the lane, gazes hooked on the backs of Daxeel and Eamon.

My mind flutters with rushed thought, lingering on the idea of screaming at the top of my lungs as though the strangled sound will somehow break through the blasts of the sparks, and alert them both to the litalves advancing on them. The thought passes quicker than a heartbeat.

If Daxeel can’t hear me, if Eamon can’t hear me—then the litalves can’t, either.

Eamon drops his head; then there is the sudden red hue of a flame. He lights a valerian stalk, Daxeel watches the sparks.

And the litalves peel away from the wall—

My heart flings through my body and in a blink, I am fumbling for the strap around my thigh.

I have time enough to save only one, a heartbeat to act, and no voice to call out strong enough.

That heartbeat’s moment shudders into the slowest gods-damned moment to ever occur. Time on the summit whirled by me, it was panic and adrenaline and terror and urgency…

This, this is different.

I blink and time slows.

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